Water treating apparatus



June 5, 1934; o. H. PRxcE WATER TREATING' APPARATUS Filed Dec. 7. 1951mvENroR ORL o H. ,DR/c5 ATTORNEY Patented June 5, 1934 UNITED STATESPATENT OFFICE WATER TREATING APPARATUS Orlo H. Price, Bloomington, Ill.,assignor to Williams Oil-O-Matic Heating Corporation, Bloomington, Ill.,a corporation of Illinois Application December 7, 1931, Serial No.579,434

2 Claims. (Cl. 210-16) -a certain proportion of the lime passes over insolution from the settling tank to the usual sand lter and it iscustomary to treat the water leaving the settling tank with carbondioxide before delivering to the sand filter whereby the lime carriedover from the settlingtank is precipitated and will be removed by thesand lter.

It has been found` that the burning of oil in a combustion chamber whenproperly regulated will produce the carbon dioxide so employed forprecipitating the lime and this invention relates particularly to theinstallation of an oil burner for this purpose in such a water softeningdevice and further relates to the proper control of the 4products ofcombustion YAfrom the oil burner whereby when the water treatment systemis in operation, communication from the combustion chamberto the chimneywill be automatically cut off and when the system ceases to operate,communication between the combustion chamber and the chimney willautomatically be opened so that the products of combustion will pass offas long as the oil burner is operated.

With these and other objects in view reference is made to theaccompanying sheet of drawing which illustrates a preferred form of thisinvention with the understanding that lminor detail changes may be madewithout departing from the scope thereof Figure. 1 is a plan View of theapplication of an oil burnerfor the purpose specified illustrating thechimney in transverse section and showing the connections from thechimney to the combustion chamber and from the combustionchamber toa-scrubber and from the scrubber to a pump for delivering the carbondioxide for the precipitation of the lime, indicating by the arrows thepath followed by the products of combustion during the operation of thesystem.

Figure 2 is a similar View with a part of the top of the scr'ubberremoved and indicating by the arrows the path followed by the productsof combustion while the oil burner is operating and the water' treatmentsystem has ceased to operate.

Figure 3 is a view in perspective of the automatic damper installed inthe pipe leading from the combustion chamber to the chimney.

In the embodiment illustrated, an oil burner l of any desired commercialtype. is'shown installed in connectionwith a commercial furnace 2 whichmay include a steam boiler to supply steam power if desired or maymerely be a bricked up combustion chamber. The pipe 3 which leads theproducts of combustion from the furnace .2 is joined to a T 4, one endof which is connected y by pipe 5 to the chimney or smoke stack 6 andthe other end connected by the pipe 'l to the 65 scrubber 8. 'I'hescrubber 8 is the usual commervcial type in which the products ofvcombustion enter at the bottom and pass up through a bed of coke 9 overthe top of which water is preferably sprayed from the pipe 10. Theproducts of coml0 bustion pass off the top of the scrubber through thepipe 11 to an air compressor 12 operated "by the electric motor 13y andfrom thence through pipe 14 to be employed in the water treatment plant.The air compressor 12 is preferablyvof 75 the type which may be termed avacuum and pressure pump in that it creates a definite suction throughthe pipe l1 and expels the products of combustion under pressure throughthe pipe 14.

1 Inasmuch as the T 4 is connected to both 80. the chimney 6 and pump12, unless the suction of the pump is always greater than the up draftof the chimney, the products of combustion will not be uniformlydelivered to the pump. Therefore, a commercial draft regulator 15, suchas the type disclosed by the Breese Patent 1,628,644, May

17, 1927, having a swinging damper plate 16,

is interposed between the T 4 and the chimney 6 and is so adjusted thatthe normal pull of the pump 12 will be sufficient to close the damper-'J0 so that v all the products of combustion pass through the scrubberand are delivered by the pump through the pipe 14. Since the up draft inthe chimney varies with atmospheric conditions, a similar automaticdraft regulator 17 is 95 interposed between the chimney 6 and the firstautomatic draft regulator 15. This draft regulator 1'7 is so adjustedthat if the up draft of the chimney 6 is greater than the suction of thepump 12, atmospheric air will enter through the automatic draftregulator 17 in sufficient quantities to allow the suction ofthe "pumpto maintain the damper 16 in the pipe 5 closed. In order to obtain thegreatest percentage of carbon dioxide from the combustion of oil, aproper draft must be established from the combustion chamber andtherefore it is preferable to interpose a third automatic draftregulator 18 in the pipe 7 between the elbow 4 and the scrubber 8 sothat if for any reason the suction of the pump 12 .is greater than 110that required to produce the largest percentage of carbon dioxide, thisthird automatic regulator 18 will admit atmospheric air into the pipe'7v their construction and operation is fully described in said Breesepatent as well as their manner of adjustment and it is therefore thoughtthat no further description is necessary.

If the pipe 3 leading from the combustion chamber was connected only tothe pump 12, there would have to be a' simultaneous operation anddiscontinuance of operation of both the pump 12 and oil burner 1,otherwise if the pump ceased operating before the oil burner, therewould be no outlet for the products of combustion. If the pipe 3 fromthe-combustion chamber were connected to both the pump 12 and chimney 6,then as long as the pump 12 was operating and creating a greater suctionthan the up draft of the chimney 6, carbon dioxide would be furnishedthe water treating system and if'the oil burner continued to operateafter the pump ceased operating, the products of combustion would becarried off up the chimney, as is usual in oil burning furnaces.However, the up draft of the chimney is `a variable quantity dependingupon atmospheric conditions and under the most favorable, the apparatusmight work satisfactorily, but under other conditions, such as a highwind, the draft up the chimney might be greater than the suction of thepump and either continuously or intermittently carry off all theproducts of combustion up the chimney.

By the installation of the'automatic regulator 15 in connection with theautomatic draft regulator 17 in the pipe 5 between the pipe 3 leadingfrom the combustion chamber and the chimney 6, the pump 12 will draw allof the gases from the oil burner through the scrubber and discharge thecarbon dioxide to the system and yet the oil burner may continue tooperate after the pump has ceased operating which may be very desirablein the case that the oil burner also furnishes heat to a boiler forheating purposes or for supplying power for operating some parts of thesystem, or in case the pump becomes inoperative.

What I claim is:

1. In a water treating apparatus, the combination with a continuouslyoperating oil burner for continuously producing carbon dioxide for' saidapparatus, a combustion chamber therefor, an intermittently operatingpump, a connection from the combustion chamber to the pump forintermittently delivering ca rbon dioxide from the combustion chamber tothe apparatus, a chimney, a connection from the combustion chamber tothe chimney for delivering products of combustion to the atmosphere, anindependent automatic damper in the connection between the chimney andthe combustion chamber adapted to be closed bythe pull of the gases whenthe pump is in operation, an automatic draft regulator mounted in anintake opening provided in the said connection between the damper andchimney adapted to open upon excess draft in the chimney during theoperation of the pump to allow the damper to respond to the pull ofgases from the combustion chamber.

2. 'I'he construction of claim 1 including an additional automatic draftregulator mounted in an intake provided in the connection between thecombustion chamber and pump to automatically control the draft throughthe .combustion chamber during the operation of the pump to mosteiciently produce carbon dioxide.

ORLO H. PRICE.

